Newspapers / The Kings Mountain Herald … / March 4, 1982, edition 1 / Page 1
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r o c-: VOLUME 9S. NUMBER 9 THURSDAY, MARCH 4,1992 t- r- 'C ^ ro r. KINGS MOUNTAIN, NORl ^ ~ Off Broadway! Frances Goforth Returns Home After Successful 38-Year Career.... By GARY STEWART Editor As a little girl in her native North Dakota and as a teenager and high school student in Kings Moun tain, Frances Goforth’s main desire was to entertain people. So, it was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream when she went to New York in 1943 to perform on Broadway. After 38 years as an actress and writer, Ms. Goforth has returned to the home on 206 East King Street, where she grew up and is now living with her sister, Mildred Myers. Her acting days are a thing of the past, but she says sheli continue to write “as long as I live.” She has co-authored several successful Broadway and oft-Broadway performances with Howard Richardson, a college classmate at UNC-Chapel Hill, and many of their plays have been adapted for movies and television. It was Richardson who gave her her first oppor tunity to act, and from the word go, she knew what she wanted in life. Richardson wrote “Dark of the Moon” while working on his masters and Ph.D. degrees at Iowa and produced it at the Cambridge, Mass., Summer Theatre, Miss Goforth recalled. At that time, she was empioyed as an assistant ci ty clerk at the Kings Mountain City Hall. “He called me and said if I’d get a ticket and come up there, he’d give me a part,” she said. That was all the coaxing she needed. Lee Shubert of New York went to Cambridge to see the play, liked it and bought it. He chose five people ft'om the cast to take to New York with him, and Miss Goforth was one of the five. “Dark of the Moon” was a folk-lore type play about a witch boy in the mountains of North Carolina who wanted to be human. “He (Shubert) thought I was a wonderful actress,” Miss Goforth said. “He didn’t know I was a Southerner speaking in my native tongue.” The play opened on Broadway in March of 1944 and has been popular ever since. “Just about every big star has had a part in it,” she says. When Miss Goforth made her debut on Broad way in that play, her mother, the late Mrs. Dee Goforth, and her sister, Mildred, were in the au dience, and that gave Frances a special boost. ‘The play was to begin at 8:30 and they arrived there an hour early,” she recalled. “Mother was real ly excited and couidn’t hardly wait, but Millie, who was 14 at the time, was upset because all she wanted to do was go shopping.” Miss Goforth toured with “Dark of the Moon” with 10 different summer stock companies, perfor ming in theatres in Virginia, Maine, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. The first play she helped Richardson write was “Catch On the Wing”, a small-town comedy which has been re-written 17 times, and is to tegin in Kingsport, Tenn., in May. She hopes to be there opening night. Several other successes followed. At least one of their plays has been performed somewhere every summer. Except in the early years acting and writing were professional hobbies for Miss Goforth. From 1953 until last fall, she worked days at Saks Fifth Avenue, New York’s most exclusive retail store, in the maternity shop. “1 owe a great deal to Saks,” she said. ‘They allowed me to stay with them and pay my biih while I studied my profession. They granted me many leaves of absences.” During her 38 years in New York, Miss Goforth lived in a hotel. She wrote for about two hours each night, and fuil-time on Sundays and Mondays, her back-to-back off days. Two of her plays have been used as “openers” for rejunevated theatres in Tennessee. “Evening Star”, a comedy-tragedy about aging peopie which she Turn To Pag* 7-A >• FRANCES GOFORTH ..Jlom* From Broadway Grover Clerk To Fight New Residence Policy -■ ( By GARY STEWART _ Editor W Grover Town Council Mon day night voted 4-1 to require ci ty employees to live in Cleveland County effective July 1. The action, which was not dbcussed, came quickly after Mayor Bill McCarter asked for a motion to adjourn foliowing the close of the agenda items. When McCarter said if there was nothing else “I’ll ask for a 0 motion to adjourn”, newly- elected Commissioner Jim Howell made the motion. It was seconded by Dennis McDaniel and, after no discussion, was passed. Vickie Smith cast the lone no vote. The town employs three full time perstms, including Town Clerk Gloria Horton and A policemen Mike Brown and Derek Johnson. Mrs. Horton is the only one that does not live in Cleveland County. She lives about 100 yards from the North Carolina line in Cherokee Coun ty. S.C. One part-time employee, gar bage collector Marvin Turner, also lives outside the county. GLORIA HORTON Mrs. Horton said following the meeting that she plans to fight the decision. A five-year employee of the city, she was fired in late 1979 by a previous administration, and then rehired in early 1980 after she filed a job discrimination suit which was in vestigated by the N.C. Human Relations Council. During the investigation, the town rehired • Grover Bloodmobile Visit Set For Friday The Cleveland County Blood- mobile will be in Grover Friday from 10:30 until 4 p.m. at the First Baptist Church. The visit is for community and industrial donors. Mrs. Martha Scruggs, Blood- mobile Program Director, said the mobile lab from the Charlotte Blood Center will be there to process the first 80 pints of blood into platelets for cancer and leukemia patients. Blood for that purpose is desperately need ed, she said. The goal of the visit is 100 pints. Donors will be processed in the church basement. Bennett Brick Files Petition Of Bankruptcy Bennett Brick and Tile of Kings Mountain announced Fri day that it has filed a voluntary petition for reorganization under Chapter 11 of the Federal Bankruptcy Code. The petition was filed in the U.S. Bwkruptcy Court for the Western District of North Carolina. Under Chapter 11, a company may continue to operate its business under the protection of the court while for mulating a plan to pay its creditors. Langdon M. Cooper of Mullen, Holland and Cooper P.A. of Gastonia, attorney for the firm, said the fifing was a result of substantial losses in the last three quarters. He said the company was a victim of the economic condition in which the building industry finds itself to day. “Given time to formulate a plan of reorganization, and some upswing of activity in the building industry, and including a possible sale of some of the company’s excess real estate holdings, this could be a suc cessful reorganization with all creditors receiving substantial payment,” he said. Bennett Brick, originally a proprietorship operated by the late C.T. Bennett, has been in operation here since 1942. Since Bennett’s death in 1959, the business has been conducted by Dorus L. Bennett and C.T. Ben nett’s two sons, C.T. Bennett Jr. and John D. Bennett. The com pany employed 44 people and had an annual payroll of approx imately $500,000. Mrs. Horton and the suit was dropped. “1 plan on taking this further,” Mrs. Horton said. ‘This came as a complete surprise. It (Howell’s motion) came out all of a sudden^ out of the clear blue sky and without any discussion was pass ed. It made me think it had to be discussed by them prior to the meeting.” North Carolina Open Meetings Law prohibits a ma jority of an elected to group to meet together to discuss business. The Grover Board did go into executive session during Monday’s meeting, but did not foliow the Open Meetings Law procedure in doing so. Midway of the meeting. Com missioner Ronald Queen made the motion “to go into executive session.” The motion passed unanimously, but after returning from the session, the board did not announce what was discuss ed. Asked after adjournment, McCarter said it was “personnel.” However, the Opening Meetings Law states that “a public body may hold an ex ecutive session only upon a mo tion made and adopted in an open meeting. The motion shall state the general purpose of the executive session and must be approved by the vote of a ma jority of those present and voting.” Queen’s motion was made and approved in open session, but he did not state the general purpose of the executive session Turn To Pag* 7-A County Election Will Stand After more than a year of ser ving as “unsworn” members of the Cleveland County Board of Commissioners, Coleman Goforth, Hugh Dover and Jack Palmer will probably soon take the oath of office. The North Carolina Court of Appeals Tuesday upheld an earlier Superior Court to let stand the 1980 commissioner election, which was challenged by Bobby Crawford, one of three write-in candidates sponsored by the Association of Cleveland County Taxpayers (ACTk Crawford and two other write- in candidates-John Caveny Jr. and Duran Johnson-ran under sponsorship of the ACT as a pro test to property tax revaluations in 1980. Turn To Pog* 10-A A -fr- Pi':! WINTER AGAIN - Last w**k'a high t*mp*ratur* reading of 80 d*gr*M gar* way to anow and ic* on Friday and Saturday. Th* Photo by Gory Stowort icod limb* and buds of a soon-to-bloom dogwood tr** reminds us that there may still be some winter weather ahead. Another Winter Blast Just when the temperature rose to 80 during last Wednes day afternoon, and Kings Moun- tians began looking toward spr ing, Old Man Winter returned Friday with another blast of cold, snow and ice. Snow began to fall early Fri day morning and by the time it ended late that night, approx imately three inches had fallen in the area. There were no major casuttlties because of it, but, as usual, it did result in some ag gravation. Kings Mountain Police reported five minor snow- related accidents and many citizens of the area were without power for several hours because of broken tree limbs which fell onto power lines. Ted Huffman of the City Public Works Department said his crew cleared streets from one until seven o’clock Friday, and spent most of the day Saturday working to restore power in many areas of the city. Problems at a substation on York Road resulted in a loss of power from 2:15 a.m. until 5:15 a.m. Saturday in the areas of Southwoods, Phifer Road, and West Gold Street. PRECINCT MEETING The annual meeting of the East Kings Mountian Democratic Precinct will be held Thurs., March 11 at 8 p.m. in Room 111 (Mountaineer Room) of the Kings Mountain Com munity Center on Cleveland Avenue. All registered Democrats in the East Kings Mountain precinct are urged to attend. Problems at the sub-station on North Gaston Street resulted n power outages for many citizens in the North Piedmont area, Cansler Street, Deal Street and Sterling Drive between 4 and 9 p.m. Saturday. Huffman said the city receiv ed numerous reports of limbs on power lines throughout the day Saturday. Kings Mountain poiice were called to the scenes of four automobile accidens in a one hour period late Friday after noon. The rash of wrecks began at 505 p.m., when cars driven by Geraldine Melton of Gastonia and Michael Phillip Jones of Kings Mountain collided on Ridge Street. PtI. James Camp said Ms. Melton stopped to make a right turn on Ridge and Jones couldn't stop. He reported $50 damage to the Melton car. At 5:30, cars driven by Jill Whelton of Margrace Road and Gerald Wayne Rikard of Cansler Street collided on South Bat tleground. Officer Don Ivey reported $700 damage to Ms. Whelton’s car and $1,500 to Rikard’s. Five minutes later, cars driven by Lee Matthew Gibson of Gastonia and Charles Frederick McKee of Gastonia collided at the intersection of Highway 74 and Canterbury Road. Ivey reported $300 in damages. At 6K)5, cars driven by Vanilla Parker Henson and R.V. Degree, both of Kings Moun- Tum To Pog* 3-A KM Students Compete In High-Q Tournament Kings Mountain Senior High School participated in Super Saturday quaiifying round for the HIGH-Q tournament of high school scholars, at Central Pied mont Community College, Saturday, February 20. Teams from 45 high schools in 20 counties each answered over 75 questions on everything from anatomy and physiology to rock ’n roll to kick off the third an nual HIGH-Q, sponsored this year by WBTV, CPCC, and North Carolina National Bank. The 16 highest scoring teams advanced to this Saturday’s (February 27) Round-of-I6. Winners of those eight matches will go on to the seven matches televised by WBTV on Sunday afternoons in March and April. Those matches lead to the April 25 championship broadcast live by WBTV, in which the winners earn $2,000 and the runners-up $1,000 in scholarships for their schools. Kings Mountain’s HIGH-Q team is coached by Mrs. Brenda Neal. Team members are Pam Hatch, captain; Carl Greene. Clayton Ollis and Bob Smith III, and with alan Lawrence as alter nate and Laura Hendrixon as scorekeeper.
The Kings Mountain Herald (Kings Mountain, N.C.)
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March 4, 1982, edition 1
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